The Justice Department is appealing a federal judge’s ruling ordering the release of a 2019 legal memo that then-Attorney General Bill Barr said justified not pursuing obstruction of justice charges against then-President Donald Trump after the Mueller Report came out. The DOJ said part of the memo covered the “deliberative process privilege,” protecting policy-making processes. (Law & Crime, May 25, 2021, by Jerry Lambe)
Law professor Neal K. Katyal, The New York Times, May 26, 2021, argues that Barr’s act to keep the memo secret was an attempt to keep Trump from being charged with criminal activity, an extraordinary issue that should be open to public inspection. The Justice Department may be trying, writes Katyal, to keep Freedom of Information Act requests from interfering with prosecutors’ decisions, but that problem could be side stepped by agreeing to release the full memo without conceding it was required by the act.